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Monday, March 26, 2012

Truth or Dare? Or Is It Liar, Liar Pants on Fire

Good day Spine Nation, it's time to play truth or dare. What do Trent Northcutt, Brent Johnston, Thomas Gardner, Robert Smart, Kyle Webb, Lance Cochran, Kiki Steinberg and Lazlo Garamszegi have in common? As Richard Dawson use to say, "the answer is......................" It seems that once again the Usual Suspects have enacted a drama that will either play out in a court of law, or with a mediator, regardless, could this be a game of liar, liar, pants on fire?

On March 12th, 2012 a complaint was served in the
Superior Court for the State of California Orange County, Santa Ana on behalf of Trent
Northcutt and Brent Johnson against Phygen, LLC, Allez Spine, LLC, Thomas
Gardner, Robert Smart and 50 Does. That's like Does as in John and Jane Doe of the famous Doe family. The complaint alleges that in or about 2008,
Northcutt and Johnston designed a Dynamic Interspinous Implant Design applying
for a provisional patent on the ISP product and design including their
proprietary dynamic ratcheting
locking system., never before seen or used in the Spine Industry, as opposed to
the standard grommet nut locking system.

For those of you that do not know the industry, prior to sharing the ISP design under the protection of IP
Agreements, the Plaintiffs had consulted for Phygen and Allez Spine. That could have been their first mistake. It was during this period that
Northcutt and Johnston told Gardner, the CEO of shell companies, Phygen, aka Physician Generated, Allez Spine and Athernova about their ISP idea.
Gardner assured (wink, wink) the Plaintiffs that he would be interested
in the ISP product based on their experience and success at LANX No Thanx, the
US market leader for ISP fusions.

On May 28th, 2009 the parties signed the IP/ISP
protection agreement, specifically, a three year Non-Circumvent and
Non-Disclosure Agreement. The documents were scanned and e-mailed to all
parties. The plaintiffs signed on
behalf of Apogee Dynamics and Mssr. Lazlo Garamszegi (love that name, Could it be Lazlo from Casablanca).
Under the IS/ISP Agreement the other Defendants were shown the Plaintiffs design. At the time the Plaintiffs presented their design Gardner, Garmszegi and
Dr. John Brown indicated that they were "impressed and expressed an interest to
acquire or develop the product." After a few months the product was not acquired or developed. Mssr. Northcutt went on to work for
SpineArt as a VP in North America, and Johnston stayed on with Phygen/Allez
(gotta love these shell companies) until his departure in early 2011.

Here’s where the plot thickens. Unknown to the Plaintiffs at the time, allegedly Gardner and Smart directed the employees to create a
“secret” ISP folder and began developing the stolen IP design. In or about February of 2012, metal
prototypes were received by the Defendants, who began showing the metal
prototypes in San Francisco during the AAOS trade show. The question TSB must ask is, why
didn’t Mr. Gardner submit the product to the Spine Technology Awards, bet Robin
Young would have given Phygen a prize for the effort alone, if any of this is
true. Could have named the award something like, well let's just call it the Paul Award for old time sakes.

On February 8, 2012 as the lights went down on the city, and the sun shined on the bay, Mssr. Gardner invited Northcutt to attend the Allez/Phygen cadaver
lab. Awaiting were some former
oldies but goodies from Blackstone Medical, Kyle Webb, Lance “I took it on the chin" Cochran, Kiki “I
gotta mouth” Steinberg, and Lazlo. The Our Gang of the Spine Industry offered Northcutt some wine
and cheese , how gauche, but he declined.
As the Plaintiff toured the lab much to his surprise he noticed a
familiar ISP implant that was attached to the cadaver. Can one image that even the dead are being dragged into
this suit? Yet, although the shape of the implant was
different , it had the exact locking mechanism. Obviously at this point Northcutt realized that something did not smell right. Words were exchange, and Gardner
swiftly escorted Northcutt out the front door. Here’s where this complaint gets funny, Gardner and Smart
are attempting to sell Allez/Phygen to a financial suitor for an estimated
$15-25 million. You know what PT
Barnum once said…… The Plaintiffs
believe that the stolen device could exceed $25 million in the open market. So what do our readers think, is this truly a game of truth of dare? Or, is this a game of he says, she says. Whatever the consensus, once again, it seems like old habits die hard in the Spine Industry. You know what they say,

Got those highway blues can't you hear my motor runningFlyin' down the road with my foot on the floorAll the way in town they can hear me comin'Fords about to drop she won't do no more And I smell my motor burnin' Underneath the hood is smokeCan't stop and I can't stop got to keep movin' or I'll lose my mind

44 comments:

All of the aformentioned names deserve one another as they all belong to the same den...of thieves. Gardner will once again have to make up lies to convince the handful of surgeon investors and board members of PHYsician-GENerated that he was attacked by the cruel and unusual Northcutt/Johnston (aka, the Menendez bros.) Perhaps Johnston will pull out his "FBI contacts" and rough a few people up. This group is truly the underbelly of the industry. I hope they all eat each other alive.

From the way Trent and Brent look lately they've been eating something. The underbelly of this industry are now using this site to push their IP lawsuit/agenda? Great work Spine Blogger, you are officially a part of the that same circle.

Who comes up with this subjects? Where's the old author of Spine Blogger, this new guy hasn't a clue.

Sounds like someone from Phygen or may I say Allez-Spine has their panties in a knot. News is News whether you like it or not. Go on OTW and Orthoworld and read some more propaganda, vanilla bean sugar coated non-sense.

Dont hate on MM, or this blog because our industry, due to many external and internal factors, has become somewhat washed out. There are few positive topics to cover in our industry, other than the garbage and dirt that the greedy old spine blood cant seem unclot. This blog is a prime example of how WE as an industry are quite equally to blame for the crap you all complain about as our Govt is. I say, work hard. If someone has a competitive advantage over you that keeps them making cash, good for them, its just free enterprise, so long as its not illegal, immoral, and unethical..... So that leaves about 100 of us. Remember, Karma... is a Bitch.

Good Article. Perhaps they will start investigating the companies in the US that do the same thing. How can they fine a company for giving kickbacks based on usage and on the other hand allow POD's? Someone needs to put the OIG/DOJ's house in order! Maybe the SEC should take over DOJ/OIG.

Is it true that Lanx doesn't have a legal leg to stand on against LifeSpine's blatant ripoff of teh Aspen because Dr. Fulton never applied for a patent? Someone told me he thought that the company would have been sold way before the patent would ever have been approved....Mike Butler either has balls, or is just a crook....

Good for Trent and Brent for standing up for themselves, this sounds like once again a company tried to steal a design and got caught. Companies like Phygen need to go away and I'm glad soneone had the balls to stand up to them.

The article was written by Laszlo Garamszegi, you may ask How i know? well... He once told me his name is laszlo like the Lazlo from Casablanca. As part of his old trick he purposely misspell his name to make you all think its not him. By they way everyone Laszlo left Phygen.LLC

No its not. Laszlo is not into the musical references that this guy is into. The guy who writes here is a child of the late sixties early seventies. Laszlo would be more likely quoting Hungarian polka music, or Balkan folk tunes, or himalayan dwarf chanting.

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